Totally Broken

Try to lighten up a bit. You are anything but ordinary. You know something that they do not, and once you know that, you will be unstoppable.

Minato-ku| Tokyo, Japan

I danced and played with choreography this week for the first time since 2015. My friend and I found an outdoor space next to our apartment here in Tokyo. We set up our iPhone cameras on a yoga block and a water bottle. We had fun like dancers love to do. No power struggles, no competition, just a few ideas & choreographies to share for the love of dancing. We made art for fun because it felt good and right. The thing about creativity and inspiration is that we can find it anytime we want. It is just waiting for us to show up. It does not have to be this big scary thing. Let the light in. Let the moments happen and capture them as they come.

Totally Broken

I have fallen apart a million times.

The thing about being totally broken is that all of your parts stretch out farther than normal, so when you come back together you are a little wiser and more worldly than you were before. We treasure all of the parts that we took for granted. There is a lot of beauty in being totally broken. The more time I spend getting to know myself through sobriety, the more connected I am to an original knowingness, so when I break apart, I still know exactly who I am. This means I can stop questioning myself all the time, or at least work on becoming someone who is more sure of herself than unsure.

The Blue Bridge | Minato-Ku

Unsure and afraid were my go-to emotions jolting into control for the majority of my life, and this kind of self-doubt distanced me from myself and from the world. Being unsure and afraid meant that I sort of threw the responsibility of me into the air hoping someone more equipped for running a life would take charge. Here, you take it! I don’t know what to do with it. I gave up my power to alcohol, but long before this, I fell into the habit of giving all of my responsibility to other people and resenting them for not letting me grow. Good people who really care about us, (and even the ones who don’t but are still good people) do not want or need the burden of your entire life. This is too much weight for anyone to happily take on. Leaning on someone’s shoulder is not the same as chucking XXlbs at them. It’s hard to watch, and it is even harder to live for everyone involved. They want us to pick ourselves up, and we are the only ones who can realize we are capable of doing it. We are worth getting to know, and it is possible to reactivate ourselves and carry the weight of our story with pride. Once we dive into the rich parts of who we are and let our souls take over, things start making sense naturally. God is in here, trust me. It is all under control.

Trust

Ueno | Tokyo, Japan

I can trust myself. It takes some getting used to. All of this stuff takes some getting used to. I was reunited with my intuition, and we have been inseparable ever since : however, acknowledging that I am intuitive and reliable all of the time is still pretty new.

Life working in real time is always a surprise, so learning that we are dependable and trustworthy across the board is something that happens when we show up for ourselves on a daily basis. It happens when I remember the times where it did not exist.

I fell short for people in my life by not allowing my intuition into the situation. Channels were cut off, and I was isolated. It is always difficult to remember the past and see how we let down the people who really believed in us when we could not believe in ourselves.

Hindsight can be a great teacher once we learn to observe the past and make living amends here and now. It comes together, and then it falls apart. It comes back together, and then falls apart into different sized pieces. Always broken means we are always learning, and this probably means that we are just a lot more fluid than we ever realized. We can trust ourselves with ourselves, and this is huge.

Sober Memories

Life spills out in the strangest ways.

Tokyo National Museum of Western Art| Music, Raphael Collin

I write about this a lot because it never stops happening. The epiphanies here are endless. In the beginning of sobriety I had an intense sense of longing because I realized how much I missed out on while I was drinking. We miss remembering our lives. This is a real thing.

For me, alcohol took up all of the room for craving. I cannot crave you because all of my attention is going to this other thing. We miss out on the fleshy-human-memory cravings that keep us alive and connected. Drinking gives us a craving to drink, and we always lose ourselves in this game because it changes us. We miss out on the memories.

This maps out my life to where I am today. Reflection in sobriety can serve as the ultimate gratitude list. Look at this life here and now! Look at the momentum here. All of these memories are ours! To know that we are fueled by something more complex and sustainable than depression, anger or alcohol is a true comfort. I am fueled by knowing that I am fueled by love. The longing settles here.

Community & Closing Thoughts

What is my purpose

Here?

To love more

Love is a conversation

I want to have

With the world

The less pressure I put on myself to be more than I am, the easier it is to enjoy what is happening. Sometimes it is okay to break the routine and make time for other people. It does not seem to shake me as much as it did. The biggest difference I think over a year of sobriety is that now I can go in and out of my creative place without the fear that someone might come through and destroy it. We are learning. Coming back to the routine with a crown of braids on top of my head. I have earned an appetite for hard work, and I trust myself. Totally broken and completely whole. Lighten up. ❤

For more on the sobriety journey, follow The OAM on Instagram @the_oam, and check out The OAM facebook page (click here) ❤

8 comments

It is so true to crave the drink so much you forget about the connections you have with the people around you. I feel like my life was numb with vague memories of the talks I had with others. Alcohol made everything fuzzy, and I never felt truly present….always forgetting what others talked about. I am happy today is my 1 month sober and I feel clear and alert when I am hanging out with others now. I’m also more present with my kids and hubby, I’m giving them 100% now, instead of 50%. Thank you for your word! 😁❤️

Thank you for commenting! Yes, it’s nice to know we are living with 100% awareness. It’s all of it, and it is beautiful. One month is HUGE in this. Wow. It is a big step. You’re doing it. Sober time with family is everything ❤️

So beautifully written and with such passion and dedication for your craft. You’re writing is amazing and I am so proud of you. You have come such a long way and I couldn’t be happier for you. Stay the course and keep writing!! ♥️⚡️♥️

Beautiful!! It takes courage to be creative. I love the idea of choreography on the rooftop.

It’s taking me a while to get used to qualities like courage and strength and dependability, like you wrote about. Alcohol puts us into that victim mentality, and someone has to take care of us — to clean up the mess that the chaos creates. It’s so nice to settle into this place of strength. It’s like all those broken pieces came together to form the most beautiful abstract portrait. 💕

Shawna, you are so right. Alcohol means that someone else has to do a lot of the work for us. We forfeit our right to a full say in our own lives. Love this completely. “All those broken pieces came together to form the most beautiful abstract portrait” ❤